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CANADA’S ONLY DAILY STUDENT NEWSPAPER • FOUNDED 1906
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 2, 2014
VOLUME 107, ISSUE 94
Where oh where were the USC councillors?
Iain Boekhoff GAZETTE
FERRIS BUELLER’S NIGHT OFF. The University Students’ Council barely met quorum last Wednesday when only 38 of 73 councillors showed up to the meeting. It was the first meeting of the 2014–15 council, which was elected in February.
Katie Lear GAZETTE STAFF The incoming University Students’ Council for 2014–15 held their first meeting last Wednesday with barely enough members to meet quorum. Of the 73 councillors elected, attendance at the start of the session showed 45 members present with eight members arriving late to make 53 total. When quorum was taken later in the evening, there were only 39 members present, showing that 14 had left during the course of the meeting. “It is safe to say that this level of attendance at a USC council meeting is both atypical and problematic,” Matt Helfand, incoming USC president said. “Western has a large and diverse student population, and it is fundamental to our organization that the composition of council reflects that fact. When a large percentage of councillors are not in the room, there is no question that the
quality of discussion and representative legitimacy of the council is impaired,” he said. In order for a meeting to be valid there must be a minimum of half plus one members present — a threshold known as quorum. For the incoming council, quorum is 37 members. “This meeting is always a bit confusing, because it’s the first meeting of the new council, but faculty presidents, senators, my executive are still in office and so they are still voting members of council,” Pat Whelan, outgoing USC president, said. “It’s kind of a weird meeting in that sense because people are not sure which members, the incoming or outgoing, are supposed to be sitting on council, and so I think that’s something that the next speaker should take note of for next year this time around to remind people exactly when their terms begin and end.” The Gazette reached out to the members not in attendance to ask
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why they were absent, and received responses from 19 of the 27 members they were able to reach by e-mail. The majority of the responses referenced school commitments for their absence. Other justifications included having other plans, family concerns, illnesses and confusion over whether or not they needed to be there in the first place. According to the USC Voting Member Attendance Policy, which can be found on the “Councillors’ Corner” section of the USC website, “Any voting Member who is unable to attend a Meeting must submit her Regrets to the Speaker of Council or the Secretary Council […] at least twenty-four (24) hours prior to the scheduled Meeting time.” According to the attendance log, three of the 22 absent members submitted regrets. Despite the low attendance, Helfand is still optimistic for the incoming council. “When we are elected by our
peers there are certain expectations, and meeting attendance is one of them and it is important that we as a council collectively are fulfilling our duty,” he said. “That all said, there is certainly no malice present in this instance. I am excited to work alongside council this year and next, and I am confident that a phenomenal and dedicated group has been elected to the USC.” Whelan also stressed that he doesn’t believe the low attendance is going to continue next year. “That’s the reason why you have quorum in meetings, is to ensure that there is enough people to deliberate on a decision. Obviously everyone should be there, it would be great to have full attendance every meeting, but it’s sometimes not possible. This one is particularly the worst, but I don’t think this is a beginning of a bad trend or anything like that, I don’t think this is going to be something you should expect next year, I think it’s just an anomaly.”
Naira Ahmed GAZETTE
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